By Mirwais Harooni and Hamid Shalizi
KABUL (Reuters) - Afghan lawmakers called on
President Ashraf Ghani to resign on Wednesday over
his government's "shameful" handling of the battle
for Kunduz, the northern city which has fallen to
Taliban insurgents in their biggest victory so far in 14
years of war.
The Islamist militants seized control of Kunduz after
an audacious assault on the city on Monday, and the
promised counter-offensive from Afghan forces has
yet to materialise.
Instead, thousands of exhausted Afghan police and
soldiers are holed up at the city's airport waiting for
reinforcements from other parts of the country.
"It is shameful how they (the government) have dealt
with the situation in Kunduz," said Iqbal Safi, a
member of parliament from Kapisa province, during a
televised session of parliament.
"Ghani and Abdullah must step down," he added,
referring to Ghani's Chief Executive Abdullah
Abdullah.
Kunduz was the last city to fall when the Taliban fell
in 2001, and, in the biggest blow to Ghani since he
came to power a year ago, it has become the first
major city to be retaken by the insurgency since
then.
Other lawmakers echoed Safi's demands in a chaotic
session, with parliamentarians shouting and calling
for a gathering of elders to begin the process of
impeachment.
Ghani's first year in office has been clouded by
political infighting and escalating violence around the
country, with the United Nations recording almost
5,000 civilian casualties in the first half of the year.
Sayed Zafar Hashemi, Ghani's deputy spokesman,
said it was parliamentarians' right to protest.
"For the president, the first priorities are the safety of
the citizens in Kunduz and clearing the area of
terrorists."
He said Afghan troops were making progress, and
Ghani had ordered an investigation into how Kunduz
fell so quickly.
TROOPS GROWING WEARY
Around 5,000 Afghan troops were gathered at Kunduz
airport on Wednesday after fighting there raged late
into the night, an Afghan security official said, and
Taliban fighters were driven back with the help a
second U.S. air strike.
However, the morale of Afghan troops was flagging
after two days of continuous fighting, a district
official said.
"We still have enough forces to take on the Taliban
but sadly there is no will or resolve to fight," said
Mohammad Zahir Niazi, chief of Chardara, a district
in Kunduz.
"We are only defending."
Hundreds of Afghan security forces sent to reinforce
them were stuck in neighbouring Baghlan province as
Taliban fighters blocked roads with large stones and
sandbags, a senior Afghan security official said.
A Taliban commander acknowledged his fighters had
failed to hold the airport, but said the group's forces
were still in control of the city.
"We actually wanted to capture the airport
and organised a big attack last night," said a Taliban
commander close to Mullah Akhtar Mansour, the
Taliban's new leader.
"We could not seize the airport but captured some of
its surroundings," he said.
In the city, Sayed Sarwar Hussaini, a spokesman for
the police chief in Kunduz, said Afghan security
forces had regained control of the police
headquarters in Kunduz on Tuesday night.
"Hundreds of Taliban are killed and their dead bodies
are on streets ... right now a heavy fight is going on
inside the city," Hussaini told Reuters by telephone.
HELP FROM ABOVE
Afghan security forces have struggled to hold off a
multi-pronged insurgency since the bulk of foreign
troops withdrew at the end of last year.
Some German troops have been deployed to the
Kunduz area to help advise Afghan security forces
during the battle, a senior foreign diplomat said on
Tuesday.
Germany's defence minister had signalled on Tuesday
that she was open to delaying the withdrawal of
German soldiers from Afghanistan beyond next year.
The U.S. military has carried out two air strikes on
Kunduz since fighting began on Monday.
A U.S military official, speaking on condition of
anonymity, said one of the air strikes was carried out
in an effort to protect coalition forces after Taliban
fighters stole a tank and were heading towards the
airfield.
Even if ultimately unsuccessful, the battle for Kunduz
appears to have re-energised insurgents who only
months ago were deeply divided over who should
lead the movement following confirmation of the
death of its founder, Mullah Mohammad Omar.
The Taliban has since said one reason for the assault
on Kunduz was to prove the group was united after
the appointment of Mansour in July angered many
key figures in the insurgency.
(Additional reporting by Jessica Donati and Kay
Johnson in KABUL, Jibran Ahmed in PESHAWAR and
Phil Stewart in WASHINGTON; Writing by Krista
Mahr; Editing by Mike Collett-White, Michael Perry
and Paul Tait)

...
The airstrike occurred before dawn when a Doctors Without Borders trauma center in war- torn Kunduz was struck while doctors were treating dozens of patients. Hospital officials said they were assaulted from the air for 30 to 45 minutes, resulting in a large fire that burned some patients to death in their beds .
Among those killed were 12 of the charity groups staff members , the group said .
...

I can't help but wonder how the frig something like this is even still possible in this day and age? We have military GPS, precision guided munitions, all kinds of hi-tech gadgets ... you'd think it should be possible to try and not bomb a fucking hospital!

Well, let me ask you a question. Are the positions of hospitals known or not? It's not like they pop up out of nowhere over night. Given the bad PR this kind of incidents tends to cause, might it not be wise to err on the side of caution and refrain from dropping heavy ordnance within a radius of say 1,000 meters from a hospital if there is no pressing need?

Don't you just love the irony of it all. Sorry....bad me. The US is essentially a dysfunctional leaderless organization at this time with no clue what it is doing. This rot is now manifesting at all levels. The panic of losing Kunduz AND the political black eye from Syria-Iraq led to this screw up. Someone called in the grid square, they did not verify with eyes on and bang. I dont blame anyone, I blame everyone. Starting with that worthless pile of dogshit in Doha.

Someone called in the grid square, they did not verify with eyes on and bang.

Well, this may sound stupid, but I'm starting to think it might be a good idea to program the coordinates of hospitals and similarly problematic sites in the theater into the planes' navigation gear as "Points of Interest" and automatically pop a warning on one of the plane's MFDs if it gets very close to one of these sites to at least make the pilot aware of the risk.

I realize that even if you go out of your way to avoid collateral damage, it isn't always doable or else you just got to stop using air support altogether, but it seems to me that this one could have been avoided relatively easily.

when i was there 2012/2013 MSF was on the target list - AFAIK - when it might have come off the list I do not know

I was surprised with the film footage i saw - either the place was on the reciving end of a number of boms over a hour or so or was at the end of a Gunship for the same period - all I saw was a building on fire, I honestly expected much more damage

the hospital was from memory fairly non descript from the ground
when i was there 2012/2013 MSF was on the target list - AFAIK - when it might have come off the list I do not know
I was surprised with the film footage i saw - either the place was on the reciving end of a number of boms over a hour or so or was at the end of a Gunship for the same period - all I saw was a building on fire, I honestly expected much more damage

The outfit responsible for our security RMO, used compile a list of potential targets that were of interest to various local nefarious organisations, we neve got in the top five until one weekend when the top five moved out of town - fortunately it was only for a few days